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The Great War
In Mobian history, the Great War, also known as the Northland War, was one of the most important events ever to unfold on the planet. The Great War was a series of armed conflicts officially spanning from 3220 to 3224, with some minor battles occurring early into 3225. The main parties involved were the forces of the Overland, and the Kingdom of Acorn. The war itself was a result of the long-standing conflicts between the Mobians of the Kingdom and the Overlanders stretching back to the very creation of the Kingdom in the 24th Century. Up until the 2700s, Terra Novan Humans had been the dominant population on Mobius, so much of the conflict originally sprouted between Humanity, and its subspecies, the people of the Northland. Mobians of the Kingdom, in great love for their caretakers, stood beside them in an effort to keep the Northland at bay. However, after the 2800s when the last of the Humans of the Lost Million succumbed to Darwin's Plague, the Kingdom found itself at a numerical disadvantage, as well as a technological one. The Overland did not suffer from the Dark Ages as the Kingdom had, and as a result, they had a built up military with advanced technology that could only be rivaled by the UNSC, though they would not meet for almost half a millennium. For the next four hundred years, tensions would raise, until finally the war would ignite. History 3220 It is generally agreed by both sides that the Overland struck the first blow. The first major battle occurred early in 3220 that resulted in the death of a border guard unit when Overland Phalanxes crossed over what was then agreed to be the border of the Kingdom - the Colorado River, with an ancient structure running between the canyons, still intact and damming the river after 12,000 years since the Xorda bombardment. The phalanx, a unit identified as 10 Red 14, sneaked across the dam at night, and attacked the guard unit, leaving the camp massacred. However, unlike prior engagements, this time, 10 Red 14 left a message that the Kingdom was to be exterminated down to the last man, woman, and child. In a state of panic at the sudden and severity of the threat that had never come at such a level before, Maximilian Acorn deliberated for two weeks for a decision to come to war. In the time it took to ratify the declaration, three more Kingdom units were hit, apparently by the same phalanx around the mountains to the west of the Colorado. Panicked and seeing that the Overland intended to follow through with the threat, Maximilian subverted the council of lords and declared war directly, an action that had not been done since the founding of the Kingdom. Historians who have cross-examined the cause for the war determined that at around the same time war itself began, a major shift in politics in the Overlander government was coming to fruition. The Watchful Sentinel Part, a radical centrist organization had come to power through what is now believed to have been a manipulation of the Overlander's political system. Among their other crimes such as attempting to make the state a secular symbol of infallibility by outlawing all other forms of worship, jailing of political dissidents, and taking a direct hand in the means of production, had judged the Kingdom and every Mobian in it, to be unworthy of life and thus only good for extermination. The leader of the Sentinels, and Overlord Probst Hyneman, had been active well before declaring the war and may have been directly responsible for the Scouring of the ARK in 3184. The decision to declare an annihilation of the Kingdom was only likely one step in the plan. It should be noted that at this time, several independent Mobian city states, in fear for their lives, pledged support to the Overland as they were too far away to be helped by the Kingdom. In the modern day, these city states are looked down upon, and are rarely traded with by the dominion. However at the time the first shots were fired, these third parties were in fear for their lives and would do anything to survive what the Northland was promising. 3221 The first battles of the first year of the war were small in scale only only consisting or border wars where neither of the combatants had much in the way of full scale combat. It was in these first battles though that the Kingdon had direct observation of the strength of their enemy. In these battles, Overland Phalanxes were armed with backpack powered lasers - weapons that the Kingdom had not developed to due to the decision to develop only for peace and not battle. The Kingdom in comparison, was armed with projectile rifles that were re-used designs from the Lost Million. These blueprints had been kept in large numbers as the weapons were easier to replace and maintain. After the Dark Ages, many of the advanced weapon blueprints had been lost, or as it turned out, taken by the Overlanders. In February of 3221, the Battle of the Five Slopes was one of the first intermediate combined arms engagements of the whole war. Before this, the scale of combatants only reached to perhaps a battalion of two on either side. The Battle of the Five Slopes however magnified the conflicts. A Legion of Overlander troops met a thousand Royal Armed Forces soldiers in the mountains that separated the Overland from the Dominion of House Acorn. Thinking that they would have the upper hand, the RAF moved through mountain passes in order to re-secure the region of the dam that they had lost in November of the year prior. It was determined that the junction across the Colorado would be instrumental in moving additional ground troops. Worse so since a major roadway would eventually lead to Mobotropolis, the capital of the Kingdom. The RAF forces were completely overwhelmed, and were cut down while attempting to retreat by the Overland forces, which resulted in a stretch of land from the dam all the way down a hundred kilometers of river to fall to the AFO. This area would then be used for consolidation of forces while the Kingdom would attempt to regroup and push back. 3222 From here, the Overland decided that a different strategy was in order. Though the rest of 3221 would be uneventful in terms of large engagements, it was determined that Mobotropolis would be too difficult to assault directly as their defensive technology was greater than Overlander offensive developments. As the Mobians better designed energy films to protect them from bombardments, the decision was made to attack less defended settlements in the west which necessitated passing through an area of the Great Desert known in antiquity and even modern day as Death Valley. The Kingdom would not need to raise a finger against the AFO, as the desert did most of the work for them. The ill-fated 15th Badnik Company was an AFO force that attempted to cross Death Valley and head South where they knew lightly defended settlements were beyond the mountains. However, once halfway through, it was easily seen that there was very little to no sources of water. Tired, hot, dazed, and confused, most of this small army went insane trying to cross the desert. A survivor's account of the ordeal showed that towards the end, the 15th Badniks grew insane and started hallucinating about desert spirits rising to drink the water from their bodies. Not a single group managed to cross the desert in its entirety, making it only as far as a region covered by massive rocky structures that jutted to the sky. From here, the AFO abandoned its decision to head West, choosing to focus more on the East. On September 27th, 3222, the black operations project known as the Deathcallers went live and the first engagement of the psychologically altered soldiers occurred at the Skirmish at Northwander. While a sizable amount of Overlander military forces crossed the Colorado to head into the Southwest, Mobians began to strike to the East of the mountains, liberating captured villages and striking arms production facilities. Northwander itself was one such captured city of over seventy thousand. In the fields not far beyond the city limits, the Deathcallers, armed with signature blades and featureless masks were thrown into the fight cutting through any and all resistance. Their appearance into the war showed indicated to AFO high command that the Kingdom would not go quietly into the night and more importantly, was willing to do anything to win. According to legend, Maximilian Acorn would not know a single thing about this black research project, though some theorize that he was the man to give the order to create these monstrosities in the first place. 3223 This saw the beginning of the Moon Campaign as it was known to the Kingdom and the Great Debris Theater for the AFO. While the bulk of fighting was contained on Mobius' surface, several engagements occurred in space. Though the Mobians had very little in the way of a functional exo-atmospheric naval force, the consolation was that the Overlanders were in the same position. Both sides used ships hundreds of years old that were precious due to the lack of infrastructure to replace them. As a rule then, both sides generally left ships intact and more attacked the men and women who crewed them. Due to the vast distances between vessels in the void of space, accurate firing could not be achieved, which either necessitated the ships to grow closer to one another in order to initiate an attack or boarding action, or forced them to continue on their way with each other still in radar view but not visual range. Sometimes Overlander and RAF ships would be only fifty kilometers away from one another. Most vessels were small, but large ships on the other hand were even more precious as vessels of their size were far more difficult, if not impossible to replace. Ships like the Dignity served as mobile command centers rather than combat platforms and generally operated outside of Mobius' gravity well where engagement would be difficult to accomplish. The Great Debris Field however was another matter entirely. The shattered remains of the moon, broken by some unknown cataclysm, was the site of far bloodier battles. Within the Debris Field, multiple small bases were established prior to the war breaking out. Traditionally, these bases were generally left alone as a non-aggression condition, but with the war reaching terminal levels back on the ground, it was clear that the agreements of the past were no longer valid. Among these bases, infiltration was a common occurrence. RAF and AFO forces fought one another in the vacuum with spacesuits and firearms. The goal of the conflict here on both sides was to secure as many factories and refineries so that materials could be sent back to Mobius for the war effort. Despite taking place far from Mobius' surface, the worst fighting of the war was fought here in what was left of the moon. The complete silence of the vacuum was covered by gunfire that ripped into spacesuits killing Mobian and Overlander alike. If it wasn't the bullets that ended the lives of these soldiers, it was the vacuum itself, leading to those with pierced suits to slowly die without quick action. Some fighting even occured on the surface of the moon itself, near the exposed section of the body. Despite creating a navigational hazard for any approaching ship, the massive chunk of the satellite torn away revealed deposits of materials that were invisible from orbit. The same sort of fighting occurred down on the regolith as in orbit. One of the most notable engagements in this campaign was the Battle of Mare Tranquilitatis, where an RAF mining team was attacked by AFO forces that sought to recapture the facility located in this lunar depression. The facility itself had changed hands several times throughout the campaign with the bodies of the previous defenders preserved on the lunar surface. This time however, the battle was notable for including the first orbital bombardment by a Mobian spacecraft. The RSS Ruthbee engaged ground forces using autocannons on the hull. However inaccurate from such a distance and in danger of being struck by debris, such a firing action could not be held for more than a few seconds, and with factors to take into account such as the orbital speed of the ship itself, the mere act of firing on advancing Overlanders was a heavy mathematical problem for the Ruthbee which immediately withdrew to avoid retaliation. The battle was a victory for the Overlanders in any case, who retook the mining facility with the survivors of the attack working as POWs. The Moon Campaign would continue until the end of the war and would be functionally a stalemate as no side possessed adequate enough resources to curb the other's orbital strength. 3224 3225 Behind the Scenes To write this section, I had to do a bit more research on the subject of the Great War itself. The conclusion I came to based on the actual information from the Archie source material was that there is no way that this war could have actually dragged on for five years with the level of disparity between technological levels of both the Kingdom and the Overlanders. One side had advanced technology such as directed energy weapons as seen in some of the art, and the other was armed with bows and arrows. This war should have been concluded inside of a year at the most, with the Overlanders standing as the undisputed victors being literally thousands of years ahead in technology. It seems, based on my reading into the subject that guerrilla warfare played a major part in the Mobians actually pushing back, and it seems this is where the Archie and CC universes reach a bit of a agreement, Julian's defection turned the tide of the war. However, what I couldn't wrap my head around was with all the advanced technology the Overlanders had access to, why they couldn't just call in air support to completely annihilate Mobotropolis. Of course, what we have to remember as well is that this is a work of fiction, and the 'good guys' are supposed to win, despite not having any mechanized infantry, no firearms thanks to the boneheaded decision to ban all of them even from your armed forces, and apparently not much in the way of body armor. The Chaos Chronicles represents the war in a way where a five year struggle may have more realistically taken place with both sides having access to better quality armor, weapons, and vehicles. Both sides behave like an actual army with tactical decisions, troop movements, and force application being taken into consideration. The Kingdom isn't a rag-tag group of rebel teenagers - they're well trained men at arms who know how to use firearms, though at a 22nd Century level since that's all they had. However, I think Max, realizing his mistake in attempting to keep the Kingdom at a low tech level and not just upgrade to at least approach MAD levels so that the Overlanders would think twice about engaging in a pointless war, decides to actually fund some weapon developments. So by '34 when the Indomitable shows up, these aren't just a bunch of woodland creatures living in the dell frolicking around and throwing flowers into the air. Of course, once the UNSC got involved, all bets were off. Every other force on the planet became a joke, with Kintobor being an exception. The Kingdom got access to railguns, tactical nukes, modern weapons, ammunition, and even energy shields. They even gave them a frigate gratis to replace one they lost in the Battle of Carson Valley. The UNSC even did one better and said that they would protect the Kingdom if anybody tried to attack them. The Kingdom basically became an autonomous vassal state, and the possibility of war became all but impossible as any Overlanders who decided to stay were too nervous to try and attack a civilization that has an interstellar empire with bombs that could crack planets in two. If the UNSC got to Mobius at the start of the war in '20, the Overlanders would be surrendering by Christmas on account of the two hundred kilometer wide inland sea where MegaCentral used to be. It's funny that apparently the Mobians caused the Great War on account of the Warlord of the Kingdom by the name of Kodos executed Overland scouts by snapping their damned necks presumably barehanded and delivered their corpses back to their leaders. That's a pretty good way to start a war, but my conclusion stands that the only way the Mobians would have gotten out alive was because of divine intervention, which they got in the form of Julian Kintobor. However, that turned around real quick for them. List of Appearances * Journal of Sally Acorn (Mentioned Only) * The Story of Mobius (First Appearance) * Soldier's Log (Mentioned Only)